Kayaking at Blue Springs State Park

December 9-11, 2024                                                   Most Recent Posts:
Blue Spring State Park                       Blue Spring State Park – the Manatee
Orange City, Florida                                             Walking in Old Towne

My last post was mostly about arriving at Blue Springs and my morning and evening walks to see the manatee and in one case an armadillo.  If you didn’t see it, the link is under Most Recent Posts.

This one is about kayaking at Blue Springs where the concessionaire who runs the tour boats on the St John’s River and rents kayaks and canoes from the dock area was nice enough to allow me to lock up my kayak to their rack so I could come out every morning without having to take the boat on and off the car each day.  Really really kind.

The photo above is from the kayak/canoe launch space.  Just the kind I like, no dock to have to deal with stepping down into your boar.  Just pull it out into the water and slide in.  Assuming you do not mind walking in the water.  I saw some pretty hilarious attempts here to get in canoes without stepping in the water.  wish I could have filmed them.

I spent every weekday morning from December 5 through 10 on the water.  Too many people on week-ends.    Wonderful mornings with many birds to watch

                                                    Double Crested Cormorant

                                                  Black Crowned Night Heron

At this point, I took a side trail for as far as it would go.

                                        Snowy Egret with his Golden Slippers

                             A limpkin blending in with the epiphytes

                                                            Red Tailed Hawk

                                                              Tricolored Heron

If you’d like to see a short video of this Little Blue Heron looking for lunch, click this link.   Not sure what is wrong with the focus on my Canon.  Does anyone know if a camera shop will look it over and possibly find what’s wrong or is this another case of can’t repair and into the landfill.  Don’t get me started on that.

This is the first of the many gators I saw on my paddles.   I know how much Pam Sprouse loves to see them.

Does he look relaxed?

It was a really beautiful side water trail off the Saint John’s River until….

…there was no way to paddle through all the water hyacinth,  water lettuce and hydrilla clogging the water way.    This is a real problem in  Florida where public lakes are connected by creeks, rivers or constructed canals that ultimately lead to the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlantic Ocean. Some of the largest pumps in the world are used to manage storm runoff and keep the surrounding areas from flooding when a hurricane roars in. But these invasive plants and weeds overgrow the waterways, wreak havoc and promote flooding by jamming pumps and blocking water flow.   And of course they block folks like me as well.

                                        American White Ibis.  Remember him for later

                                     An Eastern Kingbird?   Anyone know for sure?

  I am sure that this is the lovely male Anhinga.

Ready for flight.

The White Ibis often travel in flocks.

Obviously a couple of  Egrets have joined the Ibis.

At sunset I often see them flying in packs to roost in the trees.

This was the only Wood Stork I’ve seen yet this year and he was not posing for pictures today.  I almost missed him on the top branch with this group.

Standing on one foot.  Can you do that?

On my way back to the dock I would always go by the end of the spring run which is blocked off to boats with these buoys.  Often there were manatee hanging around inside and outside the buoys.

On one day I was surprised by a manatee going under my boat and surfacing, lifting me a bit out of the water.

Had I known he was there, I would have moved away.  Luckily he was just playing with me and didn’t dump me out.   But a serious surprise.

And then there were more alligators but not near the spring run.  I like this reflection picture.

They always appear to be smiling.

Black Crowned Night Heron.

Not much of a toothy grin.

Great Blue Heron.  I saw many of them each day.

Alligators I see on the banks and in the water.

To me they really have an ancient look.  And no wonder, as a species they are over 150 million years old.  The oldest known alligator fossils in the southeastern United States are from Florida, and date back to about 28–26 million years ago.

They can be cruising along just barely out of the water, sometimes with just their eyes and then they slowly sink down under the water and are disappear.

The Belted Kingfisher is very hard to catch sitting in one place.

The brown neck feathers of the female Anhinga look like velvet.

They were everywhere.

Here’s a sort of toothy grin…bit of an overbite.

Back out in the river, headed for home.

I’ll take my sitIN kayak rather than a craft like this given the gators thank you.
I am definitely not afraid of them but this was pretty brave or fool hardly I thought.

Hmmmm……who is he looking for?

I’m only half way through my two week stay at Blue Spring when I get side tracked so to speak.  More on that in my next post.